This disclosure generally relates to haptic alerts, and more particularly, to active material based haptic alerts for alerting a driver and/or passenger of a condition.
Haptic-based alert systems are emerging in the marketplace to provide a signal to the drivers and/or occupants of a vehicle of various conditions that may occur in the forward, side (left and right), and rear directions. For example, it is known to provide vibrotactile devices and displacement devices to alert a driver of a potential impact event or to warn a driver when the vehicle drifts out of a designated lane. All of these haptic based alert systems utilize mechanical actuators such as solenoids, pistons, and the like that act in concert to provide the desired haptic alert. Conventional mechanical actuators are costly, their form factor is large, they have higher power consumption, and it is not a straightforward process to couple their output to the driver. Moreover, even when conventional mechanical actuators can be made to fit, their large form factor often modifies the normal shape and feel of the vehicle surfaces that the actuators are under. This can result in reduced comfort for the driver and passengers.
While these prior art haptic based systems can be adequate for their intended use, it is desirable to provide other types of systems that overcome some of the problems and response limitations inherent with the use of mechanical actuators.